Arrow Boss Says Season 4 Villain Will Make Ra's al Ghul Look Like a Nursery School Kid

Arrow makes its return to TV tonight, and the show's Executive Producer has suggested that Oliver and his team will be coming up against their most dangerous foe yet. While Ra's al Ghul may appear to be about as fearsome as they come in the DC villains universe, Andrew Kreisberg says Damien Dahrk's plans for the Green Arrow will be unlike anything we've seen before.

We've always referred to Ra's al Ghul as the worst thing that can happen to Oliver and his team, but when you see the first two episodes of season four you'll quickly realize that Ra's was in the nursery compared to what Damien's got in store for everybody.

To look at him, Neil McDonough's Damien Darhk might not look like he can muster something worthy of reducing Ra's to a playground bully, but those who know the DC Comics character will be fully aware of his potential. With his superior intellect and hand-to-hand combat training, Dahrk can be more than a match for the Green Arrow. Such is Dahrk's ability as a villain, Kreisberg says that pretty much the entire season will be dedicated to Oliver's battle with the new face in town.

And a lot of times we won't even get a glimpse of who the big bad of the season is until we're deeper in, and so we thought it would be interesting to see Damien come out swinging and say this season is about the Green Arrow vs. Damien Dahrk right away. The first episode is the first battle between them.

Another area Dahrk scores points in over Ra's is humor, which may not be a pre-requisite for a classic comic book villain, but as the Joker has shown us multiple times, it's always nice to have. According to Kreisberg, Dahrk's superior intellect will result in a more light-hearted villain who is able to crack jokes just as often as he cracks skulls.

He's a different villain for us than what we've done before. Damien really enjoys being a bad guy. His ultimate motivations, we're going to keep a mystery. He's a bit more colorful, a bit more fun and is very dangerous and commanding and leads an army of followers who would die at his command. But he's funnier, more charming, and fits in with our whole shading this year where we've made things lighter. We made Oliver a little more approachable and let him have some more fun. In a way, the villain mirrors that.

It's refreshing to hear that Arrow will be taking a lighter tone this season. Maybe it was the contrast with its counterpart, The Flash, but too often Season 3 of Arrow felt as though it was taking itself too seriously, underutilizing the comedic talents of Emily Bett Rickards and instead leaving Brandon Routh to manage the show's limited wisecrack quota, which by the way, he did with aplomb.

Hopefully, Felicity will once more become a comedic force on the show and if she does, we can hopefully thank the fact that she is in a better place emotionally. Felicity and Oliver are settling down, and while we don't expect their suburban bliss to last beyond the first episode, Kreisberg says their relationship will remain safe throughout the show's fourth season.

It wouldn't be Arrow if we didn't toss a few curve balls. But yes, they're happy. They're now very openly a couple and living together. It has a very different feel to see whatever struggles they face, at the end of the day, they're two people who love each other. There will be lighter, nice, heartwarming end-of-episode, curled-up-on-the-couch moments for our two lovers who are no longer star-crossed.